you know me from ftn fantasy I'm the Deep oh we had a problem yeah it just it just popped now hi well start over just start over no we're gonna start with the seam theme song again here we go [Music] Monday Night Football picks and a week one recap hi welcome to the ftn fantasy shots and tener NFL podcast this time it seems to be working I'm Aaron Shotz from ftn fantasy he's Mike taner from the two deep Zone at Mike T.S substack docomo of our sponsor it's Underdog fantasy the NL season is back and there's no better way to celebrate than with Underdog fantasy it is the easiest place to play fantasy sports and the fastest growing fantasy app in the industry Underdog is now offering a new customer ftn special with up to ,000 on your first time deposit the underdog app is easy to use and weekly contests such as the onside kick the double doink and the two-minute drill are all back head over to Underdog for a deposit match up to $1,000 when you sign up with code ftn NFL season is here Underdog fantasy is the best place to celebrate the NFL season all right Mike so uh I was looking for sort of an overriding story of week one and I think it was that the rookie quarterbacks were bad you are right you aren't you glad that we were not on the train of which of these guys is the most like Patrick Mahomes and which is the most well what I said was that of all the rookie quarterbacks it's probably one of them will be good and one of them will be horrendous and the other couple will just be kind of bad now I said Anthony Richardson should count among the rookie quarterbacks and he was good but let's count will Levis among the rookie quarterbacks under the same circumstances well he played a little bit more than Richardson last year but he was bad was a little bit more yes um but of the rookie rookies it was three welcome to the NFL experiences yeah Jaden Daniels was I think a little bit better partly because of the running yeah you know he had running value it was interesting you know damy Brown is their number two receiver he didn't throw to him once only threw to mclen four times almost all of his passes were little throws to The Backs underneath to Robinson to Eckler just and almost like in the middle of the field not into the flats that's most of the passing he was doing a lot of design runs a lot of scrambling and a lot of garbage time too because the Buccaneers were in control contr for most of that game and speaking of throws underneath bonix yes Bonnie Prince Bard sideways the man who uh has innovated the air inch um and this is this is Shawn pton and this is Shawn Payton by Design and this is what we expected like he's going to get the ball out of his hands quickly and dump it into the flats to the running backs we had no idea that that meant he was just going to dump the ball to a covered running back about six feet away from him on the field and let that running back just get hammered Time After Time After Time as the Seahawks defense waited for him uh Jalil mcin I asked you to pull this for me because Jalil mlin I I thought he was gonna set some kind of D record low dard record in terms of how bad his performance was nope just the worst of the week not a record okay well he he had five targets five receptions one yard and this was it was not his fault obviously the ball gets to him he turns around two Defenders Hammer him also on one of them finally someone just sideswipes him and he fumbles and that gives the Seahawks all the Seahawks were playing very poorly as well for most of this game they have two safeties uh but that gives the Seahawks the ball to set up a score that lets them go ahead but I mean Payton was like uh it was almost like helicopter parenting B Knicks in that you know throw a one yard pass very good throw a one yard pass now we'll punt um and that was the entire game until garbage time uh so I have a couple of categories of things for us to discuss and don't forget if you watch us live this is our first Monday show we're on Mondays and Thursdays at 11: am Eastern you can ask questions and make comments we'll put them on the little screen uh which team most surprised you by being better than you expected I am going to go with those Tampa Bay Buccaneers um they ran the ball better than I expected the new off offense is more Dynamic certainly the Liam Cohen offense is more McVey like than that 1974 thing they ran last year I saw a stat by the way that Bucky Irving had more rushing yards than every other rookie running back combined this week really had a nice little game I didn't know it was that good Blake Korum did not see a snap for the Rams oh that's a good point there was a lot of kirn w i I'm guessing it was a pass protection thing yeah we're not putting the rookie out there when our left tackle is out and we need to need to do everything to protect Stafford but back to the Buccaneers yes they were impressive yes defense looked very good protection look and we know about Evans we know about Godwin obviously these guys can play um they're getting them the ball in different ways and they're using the secondary players more and yeah Irving is a more Dynamic back he can catch the ball out of the back field um I'm not predicting a Super Bowl or anything but it reinforces some of the things that we were saying about the NFC South uh I'm going to pick two uh better than I expected the first is the Steelers defense you know dvoa had them regressing they certainly didn't look look like they are regressing they they got a Little Help from the Falcons but help from the fact that Kirk Cousins can't move yeah right so they didn't like did never put him under Center and they never play action the whole that is not going to work in the long term like that is a problem NE they never play actioned him or they did not run a play action all game most of their game plan was beon so you're gonna run bejon a lot I mean they ran him like like 12 times in the first half but not run play action off of it right and you know like I mean we always talk about play action does not actually require the Run no but work because the running back there's the fear of the handoff even if you it's the first play of the game if bejon Robinson is the running back play action fear starts on the first play of the game and and it just naturally freezes the underneath no matter what and it just they just and they never used it because they're afraid of cousins moving around and cousins in the past was a good roll out passer they had a lot of designs in Minnesota where he would do a play action roll out get the ball to a tight end Etc taking that out of his game I watched that and I watched some of the hilarity I watch the ball bounce off of the motion man's uh uh hip when he goes in motion for the snap etc etc ET but I guess I didn't notice how onedimensional or Zero Dimensional the the the Falcons passing red mat says now the rationale for drafting penex becomes clear if if cousins is like this for another three weeks we are going to be a narrative hell the the rationale for drafting penex becomes clear and the narrative for signing cousins becomes incomprehensible right because didn't you work this guy out before you gave him all this money to find out whether he was mobile right and know that he needs time to come back from the Achilles and in two months he'll be fine I don't then you keep hinek you should kep H around if that's if that's how immobile how how limited they're gonna be the other team that was better than I expected was the Eagles yeah and the interesting thing is dvoa disagrees they actually ended up with a lower dvoa than Green Bay although they had a bigger postgame win expectancy because they were better passing the ball than Green Bay and they had more plays than Green Bay it was a better overall performance as far as like the performance itself as opposed to the predictive value but when I look at the Eagles I was like first of all I know they had a couple of messed up snaps but the blocking from the offensive line did not miss Kelsey as much as I expected right right like the actual like like McKai beckon also yeah he's playing pretty darn good he playing well like what's his name uh the offensive line coach Southland is amazing yes yes and getting beckam's mind right is amazing and and of course we'll hope see if his body holds out but and then the defense once you control for the fact that the Packers are pretty good offense and that there were a couple of blown coverages yeah I thought the defense was better than I expected to you saw good plays from Zack bomb thank you Saints for not paying him because you paid everybody else the Eagles will take him noobe Dean made a c had a couple of whiffs but made a couple of plays um and and I'm surprised by the dvoa because I look at those yeah I'm surprised too by the way okay because I look at those snaps and like those Snaps are like a touchdown swing overall one at the end the late the Jordan love injury doesn't happen if if there's not a bad snap at the very end of the game because the Eagles probably get a touchdown one at the beginning gives the Packers a field goal and also I look at some of the defensive penalties and extended drives or a couple of roughness fouls yeah they had a huge impact because there were some stalls Packers drives that continue to be I know and those aren't in dvoa so you would think that the Eagles would come out higher and yet yeah I was a little surprised too but I my eyesight certainly I felt like the eagles they played better than I expected and and the Packers are a good team they did it against a good team right uh what team surprised you by being worse than you expected Jacksonville Jaguars I was optimistic that they're going to put a lot of the problems in the second half of the Season behind them I chalked a lot of that up to Trevor Lawrence's injury and sort of a snowballing effect kind of like what the Eagles went through they come out in this game they take a lead it look like they they've kind of got control over things because the Dolphins uh you know dealing with some stuff before the game and then uh they come out and they're missing fourth down conversions and stuff like that and then the Jaguars just go into this Fugue state with the the fumble going in by etn turn around the 80 yard play to Tyreek and then they should they should be in this game there's plenty of chances to stay in this game they can't move the ball they're committing penalties they're they're they just look flat and listless and they hang around until the Dolphins come out and get the win I will say on the Tyreek Hill touchdown I don't know what the Jaguars are supposed to do like like the Jaguars defensive backs took a fine angle yeah they just Hill is just too fast there's just there's I mean there's just nothing you can do right when when combine that with the play before it losing all the other stuff yeah yeah like a 14-point mood swing and then you're done for the day and that that feels too much like a Jaguars team I've seen in the past and and like an Eagles team I saw a lot in the late 201s uh my team that was worse than expected is the Cincinnati Bengals although both of us uh picked you know I'm not picking every game against the spread anymore but I'm still doing my little system just to figure out what picks I do want to make and and it did have the Patriots pick and you said you put money on the Patriots plus 7.5 and especially with t Higgins out we both thought this game would be a little closer than the line but honestly the Bengals just look bored um Jamar Chase complained afterwards about the coaches not getting him the ball it's not the coaches fault it's not like they didn't put you out there and and not have you run Roots like Jamar Chase ran Ro it Christian Gonzalez locked him down Chase's one big play was a Zone coverage where Gonzalez was not near him and they really kind of learned that without Higgins and Boyd around a top Corner may be able to shut chase down and then they're not getting as much from the other guys yosias and and Irwin and stuff right they need Higgins back right I mean you just named the names of the other guys like oh that's not who you can rely upon in your passing game and no those guys are good threes but they're not good twos yeah and they're okay threes I guess they did try to get the ball to Chase they were trying to work all these little in space plays to yeah once they realized that Gonzalez had him locked they started like did the screen to him and like little curl like a curl where Gonzalez had to um had to uh obey you know he had to respect the speed so he had to play back so they would just run a little curl for eight yards or whatever yeah yeah they it was unbelievable flat I kept waiting like when are they going to wake up they had touchdown nuli by penalty followed by a fumble um they had what was it a return touchdown they get no was a they fumbled a punt return no fumbled a punt return yeah they fumbled Charlie Jones another one of their receivers fumbles that punt return and I guess what mind what was mindboggling was when they punted late in the game that was the the absolutely mindboggling was fourth and five you have burrow you have Chase you have a gazillion dollar offensive line you can't find six yards to get down the field and score you're going to trust defense to make an absolute do or ey stop one first down and it's over and by the way their defense their run defense was pushed around all day by a bad offensive line right they could they could rush brette I I I watch them they're just getting pressure on Basset B's getting rid of the ball yeah but running game wise they were getting pushed back this is bad this Hendrickson was good Hendrickson had a good game he got to brisette a couple of times where brisette like just got it off not a good sign if they're already chirping at their own coaching staff a little bit uh definitely not a good sign Jim staly says do either of you have a favorite week one overreaction that you have already seen I think the overreactions have been low this year I'm kind of surpris pleasantly surprised by how much everybody's taking a little bit of a weight and see attitude I think the one overreaction I've already seen is um that we've finally reached equilibrium between passing and running because the quarterbacks had a bad week in week one that that means that we finally reached the point where running is as efficient as passing again like it's 1983 again like it's one week guys like let's not go crazy yeah I you know what part of it is I've muted a lot of the super overreaction you guys and it's right I'm not like paying attention to skip Bal right and the midday shows haven't come out yet so I don't know some of them some of the ones like you know are the Giants you know the worst team in the NFL or are the Panthers those are accurate those are accurate reactions I think uh the one I think I'm plan to talk about it a little bit is there was a lot of Xavier worthy takes coming out a Thursday night yes and I think he's going to be very very good but he's going to be this one-dimensional speed burner reverse and screen and and clear outout guy and there was a lot of man if the bills the Bills should have gotten this guy and it's like first of all Keon Coleman was good yeah yeah he played well that they mov second of all that first the the end round was awesome but that second one I would have scored one he was so unbelievably not covered on the second touchdown he was he was and again I think he's going to have value I'm not a huge Keon Coleman fan here but you know let's pump the bra had a good first week though yeah it is it is week one and and he yeah he and Coleman did play well against the Cardinals yeah useful title points out by the way that poor Munich Germany is getting the Giants versus the Panthers way to spread the game guys oh I don't like the sound of that don't want to get them mad by the way your system I I I I made money on the Vikings off of your picks yep I made money on the Patriots off of your picks um I think you had the Cowboys I did have the Cowboys yeah I made my and of course I ignored the Falcons pick because never bet on the Falcons had a really good weekend the P the picks are are cruising right now just ignore the Falcons so let's take some victory Labs okay all right I'm going to go first because Andrew Dy says I need to take a Saints Victory lab Beautiful s a i n TS Saints how about those now I mean come on first of all we all know the Panthers are bad second of all it's just one game but I think they went out there and showed they don't suck they definitely don't suck and it's the veterans on the defense they got speed on the offense you know guys like rashed Shahed are young players who can yeah and they they won big with without getting much out of their best wide receiver or right I although I mean I just started dipping into the tape of that they were playing Coastal Carolina they really I mean the Panthers are yeah but I mean Shahed on his long touchdown beat JC horn JC horn is a good player that is and and Horn is a good player he was isolated but he should have been able to stay within two yards which he didn't but that's the point of your projections is they're going to play the Panthers again they're going to face this team again they're scheduling they're gonna play the Falcons twice with Kirk Cousins can't move around right right so you get split against the Buccaneers and you start racking up these wins all of these weaker opponents we see how bad the bad teams are we see how bad the Raiders were how bad the Giants were all these terrible teams you start to appreciate the sort of mediocrity professional mediocrity of a team like the Saints and what that can do in terms of overs and stuff speaking of which Antonio Pierce going on fourth and one not going for it on fourth and one in opposing territory while losing in the fourth quarter with like four minutes left what the hell dude I know I I missed that and walk through and I saw it I was like there's conservative and then there's insane right and this is this is who we are tough team three tight end offense you know but no but we're not doing this against this team let's get the ball back to the Chargers and let's give Herbert and Company a chance to to jam it down our throats which they did what is your Victory lap of the day it was that Cowboys Browns game we talked about it on Thursday I was gobsmacked that the Browns were they were still two-point favorites when I played it on Sunday morning when we knew their tackles were injured when we knew both offensive tackles were injured um and it it highlights both sides of things one we're on year three of deshun Watson's not that guy anymore no he is not it's not coming back it's never happening it's kind of a Russell Wilson it's not just stats too if you read people who do film he's he's making bad decisions and he's missing open guys like it's it's it's bad yeah he's missing by three four yards on these passes the balls are just sailing out of bounds or they're bouncing up the guys or he's or he's not seeing them in the first place or guys are open and he's just not throwing the ball not seeing he doesn't look comfortable he bails from the pocket he doesn't run that well anymore he runs okay but like he's bailing from the pocket getting down by from behind by Eric Kendrick's types and the flip side of that is this Cowboys team that we just roasted for six months for contractual reasons and for you know haahha Jerry reasons and you come out in the field with a paid Prescott a paid CD lamb Micah Parsons Travon digs uh and you're significantly better than this class of Team you're in in this position where you're gonna go out there and win a ton of games this year based on and I've got to think that the paying of Micah Parsons is coming yes yeah they're not letting him hit free agency they're oh no I mean they might turn it into another drama because it's what they do now but the cap issues are pretty much 2026 issues like whatever happens with this cap it's pushed two years down the line they had tons of money to spend and yeah this may mean obviously the tank Lawrence is gonna go and all these other guys are going to go but they didn't create like this headache for themselves next year they solved this year's problem and kind of solve next year's problem once Mike is taken care of yeah all right let me count down the dvoa top 10 give a little bit of a preview for everybody now of course these are not adjusted for opponent Saints are gonna be not yet adjusted for opponent Saints are gonna be nuts number 10 Buffalo all right number nine Kansas City yeah yeah yeah Eight Houston seven New England oh heavens six the Chargers five Tampa yeah and then a big gap to the final four teams okay Seattle oh no Dallas okay Minnesota yeah and number one New Orleans whooping again no opponent adjustments yet New Orleans whooping ass on the Carolina Central Carolina Panthers Carolina last in dvoa New Orleans 102% Carolina minus 93% unbelievable can I complain about the Seahawks tell me yeah I mean the that was that's Denver being bad I guess more than the Seahawks being good based Ona because of all the one yard passes must have been amazing two safeties a fumble near their own goal line uh I think it was a muff punt another almost safety where they get they get just pinned in their own yard line and they interception on the second play from scrimmage and they don't really start moving the ball until after a the fumble I talked about earlier which gives them good field position that they turned into a score and then they kind of roll a little I'm stunned I'm stunned that they ranked that high considering all the miscues on their end speaking of which by the way the new model for kickoffs I made it so that muffed kickoffs were no penalty because I thought that the way that the players are now aligned if you drop a kickoff there's no way that the defense is going to make it down to you in time to pick it up that's good point I didn't realized that velis Jones thing was gonna drop the ball 15 yards forward he's he's a remarkable individual you know he he's on that jayen regger uh the team of like how is how is this still happening um Jim St Shelty wants to know the Browns have been ruined for the foreseeable future due to the Watson trade and contract haven't they yeah oh yeah they owe him so much money for the next couple years it is really hard to imagine them putting together a good offense to go with that good defense yeah and I don't think they can bail on him financially next year they can't bail on him this year and they I mean obviously everything's possible but like the dead money hit becomes something where you can barely feel the team where he's at I think it's I don't have it in front of me I think it's beyond like the Aaron roders yeah it's it's in a 80 million or something like right it's just it's an extreme amount of money where you are basically either saying well we hope uh you know the Dak Prescott lands our lap in the sixth round or we just can't be competitive they are burned uh Monday Night Football Jets at 49ers minus four yeah I will point out that we know nothing about the Jets offense based on last year because Aaron Rogers but the Jets defense last year was fourth on first down uh really high on second down and 23rd on third down so that Jets defense might be even better this year except that they're number one Edge rusher is not here nowhere to be found not here in8 he's not where he lives their Corners are really good but yeah the good thing is that they're de they have depth in Edge rusher right they've got like Will McDonald barely played last year as a rookie so right right they have depth at that position depth in this in the secondary um I'm wondering now if everything you described about the Falcons and again Kirk Cousins is that the shape of things to come with Aaron Rogers in a few hours now the so here's here's the interesting question about that is rogers's Achilles injury is two months older than cousins that's a good point yeah okay so is it possible that Rogers is more recovered than cousins is I think that that is a definite possibility that Rogers will be able to move around in a way that cousins was not he's also four years older than cousin he's also four years older flips it in the other direction and it's such a mystery box right now because again we can't base anything on last year we can't base anything on the preseason where they were in the Skunk Works um so you know the one thing I can base things on is the San Francisco 49ers who are more or less full strength I don't have mcaffrey injury report yeah auk is apparently going to like maybe not play a full amount of snaps but he's there he'll play believe me when auk is in the game they'll throw to auk I'm not worried about that and I'm not really that worried about mcaffrey no and I'm not worried about Williams to that that much of a degree that's the known commodity right now is the team that almost won the Super Bowl last year that's pretty much back at full speed and I'm seeing them laying four I would take the 49ers minus four at home yes yes I I I I would take them laying four absolutely I've got no sense of the over under on this because again I don't I forgot to write down what it is it's 43 um yeah I guess early in the season I tend to go over on those low numbers and under on the high numbers so yeah right you're you're going against uh against certainty against like false certainty there uh Jake Silverman wants to know if you have a specific take on the hosan reic situation the things that I you know again I'm not in the locker room the things that I've read seem to suggest that he's serious like he's not he doesn't want to play for them he might not want to play anymore I'm I'm not sure I'm not basing this on things come through the rumor Mel nearby because he does live nearby but this is not based on that the sense that like he he's fine you know financially he's fine and he get if he doesn't get what he wants he'll he'll just wait on it it's it's weird but like for him to let this go this long and to not have his side of the story coming out and the whole thing went down suggested like you know it's maybe like almost like an Andrew Luck type situation where it's like well take it or leave it at this point yeah all right that does it for Monday everybody enjoy Monday Night Football uh don't forget to uh read the two deep Zone Mike T.S substack do.com make sure you're subscribed for all the dvoa numbers at ftn we should have everything up on the stats Hub by midday with uh all kinds of good stuff and we'll be back Thursday to preview week two in the NFL so long everybody [Music]